


A Pale Flower in a Putrid Marsh

by Draikinator



Category: Jurassic Park (Movies), Jurassic World (2015)
Genre: Alternate Ending, Fix-it fic, Gen, I completely forgot fixit fics existed but that is what this is, raptor bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-06
Updated: 2015-07-06
Packaged: 2018-04-08 00:22:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,003
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4283565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Draikinator/pseuds/Draikinator
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A wish fulfillment AU; the movie but with a few changes I would have liked to have seen, including a bigger focus on the importance of Owen's relationship to the squad and a heavier focus on the mistreatment of the Indominus.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Pale Flower in a Putrid Marsh

Owen rubbed the eye crest of Blue’s temples and she churred happily, pushing her head into the motion. He laughed and scooted back against the wall, shifting his legs to allow her better access and readjust herself, half curled in his lap, claws lightly digging into the fabric of his jeans as she tugged against him like a needy housecat.

Echo made an unhappy low whining noise when he jostled her with his elbow, pulling her back into consciousness. She eyed Blue but didn’t react much other than to huff and flare her nostrils, obviously feeling neglected. Owen sighed, and one handedly doggy-eared his book with his left thumb and sat it down beside him, scritching along her upper jawbone without leaving Blue.

Echo churred and shut her eyes, rolling her head into his touch and Owen smirked. Here he was, sitting in a pile of detritus in the Raptor enclosure doing something no one else in the world had ever done, had ever thought possible, had ever even wanted to try- snuggling with them like housepets while he tried to finish some light reading. Tried being the keyword, because like housepets, four adolescent velociraptors were incredibly needy. He was certain the behaviourists were eating this up.

He half-picked up Blue and rolled her off of his legs, standing up and she chirp-whined, righting herself awkwardly with a snuffle. Charlie was already skittering away towards far wall expectantly, waiting for him to chase her, because she always had ten times the nervous play energy her older siblings did. Blue grumbled but played along, joining in on the afternoon game of tag as usual, like a teenager who thought she was getting too old and cool to keep playing kids games.

* * *

 

Owen’s hands were shaking, holding the egg, when it cracked. He could feel the rough yet smooth shell of it so distinctly against his calloused palms and the scent of salt and fat and blood and birth was so pungent in his nostrils- this whole moment was so pure and intense he was certain he would retain it for the remainder of his life.

The tip of the eggshell burst outward and he tensed, surprised, but the following motion was far more gentle, one small, delicate, scaled muzzle pushing up against the edge of the shell and the world beyond.

“Hey there little girl,” he whispered, resisting the urge to peel back the shell for her, “Welcome to the world. I’ve been waiting for you.”

* * *

 

“So let me get this straight,” he said slowly, “You… Created this animal, from modge podged bits of other animals into this- corporate sponsored frankenstein monster- and then you left her alone? With no companionship, no play, no- no nothing but day in day out craned in meals??”

Claire shifted awkwardly in her heels and eyed him with somewhat less enthusiasm than before, “Well, when you put it like that, it sounds like you want to call animal control on us.”

“You don’t think that’s appropriate?? You don’t think you’ve mistreated this animal at all?”

“It’s not an animal, Mr. Grady, it’s a dinosaur.”

“Completely ignoring the fact you seem to think a dinosaur is _not_ an animal, _she_ is _not_ a _dinosaur_! You have no idea _what_ she is even though you _made_ her!”

Claire narrowed her eyes at him, “I know it’s going to make this park a lot of money, Owen, if we can train it.”

“Forget training, at this point you’ll be lucky if she doesn’t kill anyone that goes near her- and I wouldn’t even halfway blame her.” He pressed his face against the glass, searching the enclosure, “Where, uh. Where is she?”

* * *

 

Owen groaned and adjusted the shredded remains of the sleeping bag underneath him, only to freeze when Charlie cried out, waking up, before scuttling into his lap and sobbing high pitched raptor squeals.

“No, please, shshh, no,” he said, desperately exhausted, “Charlie, girl, come on- oh, my god, please, it’s like three in the morning, it’s not feeding time yet, please be quiet and let me sleep, I’m going to die.”

She didn’t seem to understand much more than his placating tone but pouted anyway, butting her tiny three month old head into his neck, purring and whining. Owen prayed she wouldn’t wake up Echo, the whiniest of them all, but he could feel her stirring against his armpit and swore.

* * *

 

Owen pressed his forehead against the flat of Blue’s muzzle, whispering encouragement before he went quiet and drew back, looking her in the eye.

“Blue.”

She perked, tilting her head at him.

“Alright girl, listen up. I need you to do good today. I know you like to act up but we ain’t playin’ this time, and if you mess up these people will kill you.”

She churred low, comforting, picking up on the fear in his voice and butted her head into his shoulder in concern. Delta squirmed her way under his other arm and Charlie flopped her neck over his shoulder and whined, and he found Echo’s head in his hand, butting into the motion.

All trying to reassure him whatever he was so worried about was okay.

He stood up and walked out to saddle up his motorcycle before the salty swell of tears could pass his carefully built dams.

* * *

 

“You don’t care if I wear board shorts, do you?” Owen asked absently, tossing Delta a chunk of seared goat meat. She caught it between her razer sharp teeth and brightened immediately, pawing at the ground and looking at him expectantly, “Yeah, yeah, good job, girl.” She chirred and skittered off to a corner of the enclosure with her prize to eat it. Echo returned from where she’d taken hers to butt his elbow and nose at the bucket.

“Ah, ah, no,” he said, and she dipped her head, backing up, before he sighed, “Whatever, what the hell,” Owen sighed and pulled out a chunk, tossing it to her before pulling out one and tearing off a bite with his teeth, chewing slowly, “This is a better date night anyway.”

* * *

 

The wind was wet with South American humidity, damp underbrush bowing before his wheels and his pack’s talons, like the whole world was built to be beneath them, soft greens and harsh browns replacing red carpets.

He spun to the side, kicking up mud in a harsh break, motor snarling and jammed one boot into the muck, steadying himself as he eyed the treeline that his pack was barking at, tails up, shoulders down.

There was a lowing from the brush, a deep, huge yowl that didn’t sound like any animal he knew, and its enormous, tooth-lined maw pressed forth through the willowy curtain of foliage, puffing white breath through its meaty nostrils.

Owen held his breath at the sight of her- massive, alabaster white, with a jaw like a crocodile and red-pink eyes locked right onto him. She adjusted her weight so she was back heavy, lifted her tail, leaned forward, and screamed.

He covered his face instinctively at the noise and yelled, “Hold!” Under his fingers, which were definitely not shivering, before looking back at the Indominus Rex, a lumbering, bulky, hateful white killing machine that was now chuffing at his pack.

“What are they… Doing?” Said a voice behind him he did not turn to identify. His breath caught in his throat, thick and heavy.

“They’re communicating,” he whispered, “they’re having a conversation.”

“What?! But- how could they do that?? Are you saying- are you saying that thing’s part raptor?!”

The Indominus howled, a raptor-like noise that sounded like hate, throwing her head back before dipping low and staring at him. All his raptors turned with her to face him, eyes wide, muscles tense. The Indominus locked eye contact with Owen.

“No,” he said, “she had to sound everything out. She’s not a raptor, she’s mimicking a raptor. I know why they wouldn’t tell us what they used to make her.”

Blue leaned forward, muscles rippling, and Owen gripped the strap of his rifle.

“She’s part human.”

The Indominus Rex screamed, and all hell broke loose.

* * *

 

“Is she gonna be alright?” He asked, nervously, gesturing at the sedated raptor lying on the smooth chrome table. Barry shook his head.

“There is no way to know. We do not exactly have a lot of experience with Velociraptor illnesses.”

“Right, right…” He said absently, watching as Charlie’s ribs heaved up, heavy, drugged, laboured, and she whined low in her throat, head tilted toward him. He stepped forward on instinct and froze, gritting his teeth to resist and Barry sighed.

“Just go, whatever it is, you would have caught it by now if you were going to.”

Owen was leaning over the table, rubbing along her spine in the comforting way he knew she liked before he could even sputter a thank you and she calmed immediately, letting her eyes shut and her jaw stop struggling against the muzzle.

Maybe she’d finally get some rest.

* * *

 

Owen tugged the headstrap from around Blue’s neck, and the tiny camera hit the ground with a thump. She looked up at him with frightened eyes, wary of judgement, a low whine in the back of her throat.

“It’s okay,” he whispered, “I’m not mad.” She chirped and dipped forward, butting her head into his chest and just like that, the spell was broken, and the three surviving members of his pack were all over him like puppies he’d left at a daycare overnight, churring and purring and pressing against him desperate and lonely. He could feel Claire and the boy’s fear behind him but he didn’t dare ruin this moment- this moment of proof of everything he had felt but hadn’t dared say- his pack was his family. His family was made of vicious, sixty five million years extinct predators that could shred him like wet paper and instead were purring and butting their heads against his hands and begging to be pet.

What a strange world.

The ground shook, and Blue snarled, snapping her head around to watch the Indominus Rex stomp into the clearing of the park’s main street, concrete crinkling like a plastic bag beneath her massive weight, the night alive with her low wailing.

Owen’s pack fell in line around him, Echo snarling, Delta barking and Blue silent, heading their formation. The Rex eyed them, then howled, a high, shrieky noise that was only distantly raptor, twisted by the low hollow tones of a Rex and something eerily familiar. He shouldered his gun, fingers white knuckled against the strap, but his pack held their ground.

The Indominus stepped back, then forward again, and roared, a warped raptor help call, but his pack did not budge. She hufffed a few times and readjusted her weight, straightening up. The next sound she made was completely unrecognizable, without the raptor mimicry. The sound that felt natural to her. The Indominus’s cry.

Blue dove forward first with a yip to her packmates to fall in line, and they spread out into a flared diamond, Owen swinging the rifle up and into his waiting hands, heading up the rear of his pack, soles of his boots pounding against ruined pavement, lungs thick with fire and sea-salt air, the Indominus screaming as they fell into her, all teeth and claws and bullets and quick jabs and short ducks.

When the Indominus tossed Echo like a ragdoll Owen was lucky enough to be standing in the way, arms out, and she slammed into him, a half ton of muscle and death and howling, and they both went through the window together, their combined weight sending them skidding over a firey stove and crashing into the tiled and sullied floor, pots and ladels clattering around them in a caucophony of iron shrieks.

Owen was gasping for air, desperately shoving the burnt half of his face into the cool piddling of water pooling along the grout of the tile in the abandoned kitchen, hissing at the unpleasant feel but desperate, entire left half red and blistered from only a moment’s burn. Echo had fared similarly- she was pushing herself to her feet, scales burst like popcorn kernals along the flesh of her neck and along her spinal ridge, white with puss and red with cauterized blood. She was breathing, though, and so was he, and so was the Indominus.

He grabbed her by the snout, the unburned part and pulled her face close, whispering soft wordless churs, and she whined, licking his palm. He lowered with her until they were both laying down, and she sighed into the crook of his elbow, tiredly, but eyed him with fire.

“Stay,” he said, and she blinked at him, scrambling to get up, but he tugged her back down with him, “No! No, Echo. Stay. I already lost Charlie. Don’t- this is my job. You did enough.” She whined but stayed down this time, laying on the cool tiling as he stood and ran out of the building.

He was just in time to see Blue hurtle through the air down the street, tossed like a paper airplane and he screamed, throaty and burnt, but all it did was make the Indominus spin towards him, gouges along her jaw and red glimmering along her neck and back, huffing heavily, pulling in deep, raggedy breaths. She screamed at him, and he stepped back again, only just now suddenly realizing that he had definitely broken his left arm because it was hanging at his side uselessly and the pain was only just now beginning to register, the deep ache of the burns setting in with the torn muscles and broken bones.

He grit his teeth, eyes burning, and the Indominus stepped toward him. He ground his heel into the pavement and stepped toward her. She hesitated, eyeing him for a potential trick, recalculating. He slung the rifle from around his neck and tossed it to the side where it skittered through the wrecked ground and between two chunks of upturned concrete.

“I am not going to fight you!” He yelled, panting, and the Indominus cocked her head at him, still trying to figure out what he was doing. He stepped forward again.

“They were wrong to keep you alone, they were wrong to treat you like a monster, because you’re not, are you?” He asked, stepping forward again and for a moment, he thought he saw the glimmer of comprehension in her eyes, “You don’t have to be alone anymore. You don’t have to be a monster.” He raised one hand, unflinching, palm twisted toward her, and stopped. The wind tore at his vest, blew billowing strands of moist hair into his eyes.

She leaned forward and screamed at him, the force of her hot breath enough the whip all his hair back against his skull, but he held firm, trying to keep the trembling localized to his bones and out of his skin.

“It’s okay,” he said to her, “I’m not mad,” and churred a low, friendly raptor noise, tongue backed against his throat, jaw rigid, throaty and wet. She eyed him further, tiredly, and adjusted her feet against the ground slick with her own blood.

“It’s okay,” he said again, voice low, “You didn’t do anything but what they expected you to. You’re not a monster.”

The Indominus’s nose pressed against his palm, rough and moist and she whined. Owen rubbed along her snout comfortingly, whispering until she finally let herself collapse, body riddled with injuries. He sat down to pet her muzzle and whisper encouragment he wondered if she could understand.

Blue and Delta limped back into the clearing, both injured but alive, if only barely, and crawled to Owen. Blue draped herself scross his lap, and Delta curled aginst his right side, before yipping for Echo, who joined them, taking his left.

The Indominus snuffled against his arms, wailing quietly beneath the heavy churn of her warm white breath.

“It’s alright,” he said, “I’m sorry the world is like this.”

She churred one last time and went still and silent, slack against the pavement, and Owen let his head rest against her nose, sighing. The dawn was breaking in the distance, the night coming to a close. Blue pressed her head into his chest and whined and he reached down to pet along her jawline consolingly.

Her leg was twisted and clearly broken, and Delta had a massive gash in her right side. Echo was still burnt and probably riddled with broken ribs and closed fractures, and he scrunched his eyes shut against the hot tears threatening to overtake him.

“Owen- Owen, we- we have to _go_ -” Claire hissed, standing in the wreckage. He looked up at her, haggard and exhausted, scaley, broken children clinging to him like needy infants.

“No,” he said finally, “I’m staying.”

“Owen! You can’t _stay_ here, you’ll- you’ll die- you can’t-”

He shook his head, “The animals are all lysine deficient. In a few days they’ll all be docile and near dying. I can round them up and get the whole park back in order.”

“We’ll never reopen, Owen, it doesn’t matter.”

“If I leave, they all die.”

“Owen-”

“It’s fine, Claire,” he smiled at her, leaning away from what had been the Indominus, “I know what you’re going to say. And no, you don’t love me. You never did. Just because dinosaurs tried to kill us didn’t change that. Get out of here, alright?” She looked dubious, but he winked tiredly, “And call me, huh? I haven’t trained these little bastards to speak English just yet.”

Blue yowled offendedly and Claire stifled a laugh, eyes brimming, but she nodded with a thick swallow.

“Okay. I’ll let them know- and- be safe, okay? Don’t die out here. Not after all this. Not after everything.” He nodded at her and she took a deep, long breath, eyes moist and skin gleaming with sweat and blood, “Goodbye, Owen.”

“Goodbye, Claire.”

And she left.


End file.
